Re:Grateful Dead Fan Timothy Tyler Has Been Granted Clemency
by logfromblammo on Wednesday August 31, 2016 @05:58PM
(#12401802)
My objectivity regarding the interstate commerce clause is compromised to the point where I can't really have a rational discussion with anyone who disagrees with my opinion on it. It suffices to say that I am strongly anti-federalist, and excessive coprolalia quickly ensues whenever a strong federalist shows up.
In the most ferrous of ironies, the uniform commercial code--which was separately adopted by all 50 states in almost identical form--is probably the ideal form of legislation to be covered by the probable original intent of the interstate commerce clause, and yet there is no law that federalizes the UCC. Instead, it is used for all manner of laws that have no authorization anywhere else in the constitution.
Thus, anything further I might have to say on the topic is probably not appropriate for HN.
That's pretty clearly not the case; the so-called "interstate commerce clause" in Article I, Section 8 is perhaps more accurately the "interstate and foreign commerce clause", and expressly gives Congress the same authority to regulate trade among the states as it does for foreign trade and trade with Indian tribes; it clearly was not intended to be limited to preventing states from erecting protectionist trade barriers (which, in any case, is the focus of the Article I, Section 10, limits on states.)
> It took the 18th Amendment to prohibit "the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors...for beverage purposes" at a federal level in 1920. The Volstead Act was able to use that amendment as the basis for its authority.
The Volstead Act went into effect in 1919, the 18th Amendment was ratified in 1920, and went into effect in 1921. Its clear that Congress -- which proposed the 18th Amendment before passing the Volstead Act, which it did over a Presidential veto -- did not believe that the Amendment was necessary to support the act, though they clearly thought it was desirable (perhaps because it didn't just authorize regulation, it explicitly mandated prohibition.)